By SAMUEL OGIDAN, Abuja

President Muhammadu Buhari has been tasked to speak out on the alleged N2.5 billion transferred to family members.

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), which stated this at the weekend, said that the recent reports of massive treasury looting allegedly involving persons close to President Buhari, has further exposed his administration as a putrid citadel of corruption.

The PDP tasked the Buhari Presidency not to keep quiet but offer explanation to allegations in the media space that certain officials and individuals close to the Presidency defrauded the nation of the sum of N51 billion out of which N2.5 billion was wired to a member of Mr. President’s immediate family.

In the same vein, the PDP, in a statement by its spokesman, Kola Ologbondiyan, challenged the Buhari Presidency to speak out on allegations, also in the public space, that 122 posh properties, valued at over N1.6 trillion and seized by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), were shared and allocated to cronies on the directives of the Presidency.

“The Buhari Presidency should not pretend not to be aware that the media is awash with reports that a known confidant of Mr. President and certain officials of the Nigerian Customs defrauded our nation to the tune of N51 billion under a hazy ‘Revenue Assurance Fund’, out of which N2.5 billion was reported to have been transferred to a foundation allegedly owned by a female member of the President’s immediate family.

“This close confidant, who is alleged to be fronting for certain individuals close to the President in scandalous contracts running into billions of naira in the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) among other government agencies, was arrested at Heathrow Airport in the United Kingdom in 2019, for alleged passport scam and laundering of 200,000 pounds allegedly belonging to a particularly relation of Mr. President.”

“On the EFCC scandal, the Buhari Presidency should come clean on how the anti-graft agency was hijacked to become an instrument of treasury looting and corrupt enrichment for fraudulent friends and officials of the Buhari administration.”

“It is indeed appalling that such impunity and barefaced looting are going on under an administration that came into governance with an assurance of fighting corruption, only to end up swimming in an ocean of corruption,” the party said.

The PDP asked the Buhari Presidency to end its silence as the issues are already in the public domain, with Nigerians demanding for investigations.

The PDP therefore demanded that the Buhari Presidency should order an immediate and open investigation into the allegations into these duplicitous enterprises for which persons connected to the Presidency have again been mentioned. (Text, excluding headline, courtesy Sunday Independent)

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